 RAIN 5/13: House committee wrangles over webcast, broadcast royalties in markup meeting today ·May 13, 11:41 AM HOUSE JUDICIARY DISCUSSES GIVING SOUNDEXCHANGE, WEBCASTERS MORE TIME TO SETTLEThe House Judiciary Committee today discussed the Webcaster Settlement Act of 2009 (H. R. 2344). The bill successfully passed committee. The new bill was introduced by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) and will reportedly be introduced in the Senate by Ron Wyden (D-OR). The new bill modifies the existing Webcaster Settlement Act of 2008, extending the deadline for which webcasters and SoundExchange must agree to a royalty rate to 30 days after the enactment of the new bill.
The original bill, the Webcaster Settlement Act of 2008, set a deadline of February 15, 2009. However, SoundExchange was not able to reach deals with all webcasters by that date, including “pureplay” webcasters, small commercial webcasters, and religious broadcasters. The new bill would give webcasters and SoundExchange more time to hammer out a deal. Also discussed in today’s meeting of the House Judiciary Committee was the Performance Rights Act (H.R. 848), which also passed committee after being altered by a “Manager’s Amendment” to lower the annual fees for small radio broadcasters. 300+ WEBCASTERS PETITION CONYERS FOR ROYALTY PARITY WITH PROPOSED BROADCASTER RATESOver 300 webcasters signed on to a letter sent to Chairman Conyers, asking him to extend the newly-adopted Performance Rights Act manager’s amendment to small webcasters. The letter points out the discrepancy between proposed royalty fees to broadcast radio stations and those charged to Internet radio webcaster. Under Conyers’ amendment, broadcasters making less than $1.25 million annually would pay $5,000 annually in royalties. By comparison, the webcasters’ letter estimates, webcasters earning $1.25 million would pay $150,000 in royalties. Similarly, broadcasters earning less than $100,000 would pay $500, while webcasters earning the same amount would pay pay $10,000 in royalties.
The letter asks, “Should Congress allow small broadcasters to pay reasonable royalties but require small Internet radio webcasters to pay royalties that are 20, 30 and 40 times higher? …Please amend the Performance Rights Act to extend small broadcaster protections to small webcasters. Small webcasters are the smallest of small, but our programming is the most innovative and our playlists the most diverse.” WEBCASTERS, SOUNDEXCHANGE TO MEET ON MONDAY PANEL MODERATED BY RAIN’S KURT HANSONRAIN publisher and AccuRadio CEO Kurt Hanson will moderate the “Webcasting Issues” panel at the upcoming SanFran MusicTech Summit on Monday. Pandora CEO Joe Kennedy, Radio Paradise founder Bill Goldsmith, SoundExchange counsel Mike Huppe, and GOOM Radio Chief Sales Officer Drew Hilles will participate in the discussion. The panel is scheduled for 10:30am PDT. The event is Monday at the Hotel Kabuki in San Francisco. The complete conference schedule is here register and see a partial list of attendees here.
ANDO MEDIA PROMOTES KRASINSKI TO COOPaul Krasinski has been promoted from EVP to Chief Operating Officer of Ando Media. “Since joining Ando Media last year, Paul has demonstrated incredible leadership, vision and zeal for our company and the industry,” said Robert J. Maccini, President and CEO of Ando Media.share: del.icio.us.  Reddit  Digg  Yahoo  Wink  Windows  Google  Newsvine 
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